It’s not an offshoot of the cyclone – this was done on purpose, by yours truly, helped by that erstwhile gardening hound, Athena.
South Oz usually has a couple of wet years, followed by a longer dry period and we have just been through the wet. I’m using this year’s conditions as a baseline for the next 10. No reason for 10, just sounds like a good number.
So…we’ve been fixing the irrigation system to make it more effective in terms of water use and the number of plants watered.
It was a job that I had in the pipeline anyway – we need to widen the path through the centre of the garden to allow folks on walkers and with walking sticks to be able to make it through. As the chooks, Blackbirds and Nature in general, did their jobs over the years, the edges of the paths have collapsed and sprawled inwards, making it quite narrow. It was initially designed for me to comfortably make it through with a wheelbarrow. Now that I’m not wheelbarrowing much anymore, a new priority has become getting the green bin through to pick up the prunings for mulching.
The old system had an initial plan but then evolved and adapted to suit the plants. Some plants passed on, some grew bigger and wilder than we expected and some hogged more of the most precious liquid in the universe, killing off others. I also wanted to extend the drippers to the verge in a more effective manner. Previously, they were on the end of 4mm offshoots that I poked through the fence. This was also the method use to get to any plants that decided to grow too far away from the main lines.
The result was a somewhat fragile system at them mercy of the ravages of the chooks who often knocked the 4mm pipes from their connectors. That meant that every time we wanted to run the drippers after the chooks had been let loose, I had to go around and find and reconnect those that had been knocked off, in some instances, needing to dig around to find where the girls had diasssembled and buried them.
So, I wandered around to the big green shed and purchased 50 metres of 19mm polypipe and have started to pull up the old goof plug ridden pipe, keeping as much as I can to reuse, of course.
The verge now has its own line, tucked inconspicuously (I hope) along the fenceline, where it will water and feed the plants there. Those further out are still on their own, except little hand watering from time to time.
Each of the large squares that were made from the pipe has been divided into quarters and now reaches more plants more easily. I’ve removed some of the drippers around the larger trees too, they’re too big to benefit from a couple of litres of water and are capable of supporting themselves.
I’ve taken out the permanent, raised, low flow sprinkler heads too. Now that the trees are big enough, I’ve cut out their lower branches and a regular wobble headed sprinkler on a hose can reach everywhere if moved twice. Even though I’m quite proud of their design, removing the permanent risers and makes access a little easier. cleans things up visually.
I’m a big fan of the adjustable flow, green drippers but drippers have one disadvantage that makes them tricky to use for large areas, especially for annual crops of multiple plants – they only drip downward over a limited area. That’s not so much of a problem while the soil remains a little moist but when it dries out completely, the water is limited to a very small area and plants just out of reach can’t access it.
The solution that I want to try is to put a shrubbler in the middle of each section that has been reserved for annuals. That’s not a lot because the front garden has always been for perennials, but there are some annual herbs that I want to grow.
Last year, we opened up a part of the garden as a Sun trap in Winter. That worked well but over Summer, has not been a huge success. Plants have survived but not thrived under the Sun and the Valerian and Yacon seem to have left us, even though the bigger trees provide a few hours of shade. I’ll install a permanent piece of vertical pipe in which we can put a shade umbrella when necessary. If you’ve been with us for a while, you’ll remember that shade umbrellas were an effective, tactical part of keeping us all cool while the garden was getting established. Luckily, I kept a few.
Another tactic I’ll try is to extend the mister system all of the way through the garde, initially along the entire length of the path to near the gate. Increasing the general humidity a couple of times a day in the central parts of the garden may help some more fragile plants make it through. Luckily, I was visiting somewhere recently that had a bit of demolition work going on and I snagged two complete, mister systems. One is long enough to make it from where the existing misters end, all the way to the gate, he other is the perfect length to humidify and cool the entire backyard (which suffered too this year).
If you’re finding this information useful, share it with your community
This year, too we didn’t mulch. Usually we do but the hay mulch that I usually get was unavailable, it being a had year for hay and most of the good stuff being sold overseas. This too is providing an excellent baseline.
When the cooler weather arrives, we’ll be digging the path out to a depth of 300-600 mm, depending on how energetic we feel. This will be filled with gravel and is planned to be a long-awaited water storage area that runs through the middle of the garden. From mid-Spring onwards, any excess water from the rain tanks will be directed there, building up a reservoir of moisture for the hot weather. In theory. Maybe we’ll dig even deeper if we can get help and can afford the gravel.
Folks have been asking ‘why are you doing it in this heat’? Well, at the moment my health is on a high and I don’t mind a bit of heat. At any time my health and motivation can vanish, so it’s best to do this kind of work when I’m able. Who knows what the future has planned?
There are a lot more tips on gardening in the heat on our Summer Gardening pages. We’ll keep you informed of the progress.
